“Forced into a trip to the Galactic Core Station to see the only doctor with equipment to evaluate the cause of her escalating migraines and synesthesia, Sylvia must face the truth that stole not only her college dreams but quite possibly the hope of Earth”

This was an interesting and captivating story about self discovery for the main character, Sylvia. Interesting characters and “creatures” from AI to griffins. Kept my attention through the whole book.


Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book!

I felt this book had a really slow start. Struggled to keep me focused and interested, but gradually picked up the pace and intensity.

People were counting on her, and she didn’t want to fail this time.”

This book takes place in a futuristic world where there are immortals, humans with monster DNA, griffins, and other unexpected beings.

The main character Sylvia has a series of repeating dreams which led her to write a book comprised of her imaginings.
She is on an intergalactic ship, about to start a tour for this book when strange things start happening.
Sylvia is experiencing new worrisome sensations and visions, passengers are being interrogated and disappearing, someone steals her book, and another tells her not to let anyone find it.
Sylvia starts to wonder if everything that is happening is connected to her & her story.
Were the dreams she had more real than she could have imagined? Does the lost city from her book really exist and need to be found in order to save earth? Or were these just the ramblings of a mad man?


The narrator has a soothing voice with an easy to understand accent. She is also very good at describing action and conflict scenes while keeping you on the edge of your seat. She does great impressions from aliens to AI, and many other characters in between.

“You’ll always find me because we’re one heart”
“Courage isn’t courage if you’re never afraid.“
“It’s okay to be afraid, you just have to carry on.”
“Sometimes what you fear is the next step.”
“It is only fiction if you don’t believe.”

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Audiobooks for this Audiobook ARC.

As the author of this work, it is a special privilege to review it as a listener. Kate Walsh's thirty years of experience as a voice actor shines with diversity and depth in this multi-cast epic story of found family. From the Queen's English to East-Coast American, her voice is an instrument and she plays on every page. Five-star work Kate A. Walsh!

This book is one of those times a person with an actual archaeological AND writing background should not have picked up a book. I am that person. This is that book.

There are people walking around with Neanderthal DNA going about their daily lives these days, they were not straight up wiped out. Pretty sure that people living more than 50 years in the future will have their own pop culture references, and things like Star Wars and Spin Classes may come up (less likely with Spin Classes, I suspect) might come up but there should be references from the time. I could keep going but I am already bored.

Also we don't see any 'found family' until the very end of the book, though it's use in the blurb may have been more to do with somebody misunderstanding what the phrase means in stories. And speaking of family, it looks like the older one was 26 so that we care less when things happen to them. If you read this book, you will know exactly who I am talking about. I was going to say "so those two existed just for exposition", but it looks like one existed so we would believe the protagonist was in actual danger, and the second exists for use in an inevitable sequel. Which I won't be reading, since while I was curious about how this would play out, I didn't actually care about any of the characters. I wanted to. I just couldn't.

Anyway, some folks will love this book and good for them when they do.